SCIENCE vs. EVOLUTION

Chapter 4b:

The Age of the Earth

Why the Earth is not millions of years old

Next we shall consider EVIDENCE FROM BENEATH
THE SURFACE that the earth is quite young:

32 - ESCAPING NATURAL GAS—Oil
and gas are usually located in a porous and permeable rock, like
sandstone or limestone, which is sealed by an impermeable rock-like
shale. Fluids and gas can easily travel through the containing rock, but
more slowly pass out of the impermeable cap. Evolutionary theory
postulates that, tens or hundreds of millions of years ago, the oil and
gas were trapped in there.

But natural gas can still get through the shale
cap. A recent study analyzed the rate of escape of gas through shale
caps. It was found to be far too rapid for acceptance by evolutionary
theory. If the world were billions of years old, all the natural gas
would already have escaped.

33 - OIL PRESSURE—Frequently,
when oil well drillers first penetrate into oil, a geyser ("gusher") of
oil spews forth. Studies of the permeability of the surrounding rock
indicate that any pressure within the oil bed should have bled off
within a few thousand years, but this obviously has not happened yet.
The excessive pressure within these oil beds refutes the "old earth"
theory and provides strong evidence that these deep rock formations and
the entrapped oil are less than 7,000-10,000 years old. The great
pressures now existing in oil reserves could only have been sustained
for a few thousand years.

"Why do we see an explosive gusher when a drill
strikes oil? Because oil, like natural gas, is maintained in the
earth at enormously high pressure—about 5,000 pounds per square inch
at a depth of 10,000 feet. Supposedly oil and gas have been lying
there for millions of years. But how could they have lasted that
long without leaking or otherwise dissipating those extreme
pressures."—James Perloff, Tornado in a Junkyard (1999), p. 136.

34 - OIL SEEPAGE—A 1972 article, by *Max
Blumer, (*"Submarine Seeps: Are They a Major Source of Open Ocean Oil
Pollution?" in Science, Vol. 176, p. 1257) offers decided evidence
that the earth’s crust is not as old as evolutionist geologists had
thought. *Blumer says that oil seepage from the seafloor cannot be a
source of oceanic oil pollution. He explains that if that much had been
regularly seeping out of the ocean floor, all the oil in offshore wells
would be gone long ago if the earth were older than 20,000 years.

In contrast, geologists have already located 630
billion barrels [1,002 billion kl] of oil that can be recovered from
offshore wells. But if our planet were older than 20,000 years, there
would be no offshore oil of any kind to locate and recover through oil
rigs.

35 - LACK OF ANCIENTLY DESTROYED RESERVOIRS—All
of the oil in the world must have been placed there only in the recent
past. We can know this because if long ages of time had elapsed for
earth’s history, then we should find evidence of anciently destroyed oil
reservoirs. There would be places where all the oil had leaked out and
left only residues, which would show in drilling cores! But such
locations are never found. Coal is found in various stages of
decomposition, but oil reservoirs are never found to have seeped away.

36 - MOLTEN EARTH—Deep
within the earth, the rocks are molten; but, if the earth were
billions of years old, long ages ago our planet would have cooled
far more than it now has.

37 - VOLCANIC ERUPTIONS—There
are few active volcanoes today; yet, at some time in the past, there
were thousands of them. In chapter 14,
Effects of the Flood, we will learn that many of these were active
during the time that the oceans were filling with water.

The greater part of the earlier volcanism apparently occurred within
a narrow band of time just after the Flood. If it had lasted longer,
our world today would have a far larger amount of volcanic material
covering its surface. Instead we find that the Deluge primarily laid
down the sedimentary deposits.

But even today’s volcanoes are an indication of an
early age for the earth. If even the present low rate of volcanic
activity had continued for the long ages claimed by evolutionists for
earth’s history, there would be far more lava than there now is. Only a
young age for our world can explain the conditions we see on earth’s
surface now.

38 - ZIRCON/LEAD RATIOS—This
and the next discovery were made by R.V. Gentry; both are discussed in
detail in chapter 3, Origin of the Earth, and in his book,
Nature’s Tiny Mystery.

Zircon crystals were taken in core samples from five
levels of a very hot, dry 15,000-foot [45,720 dm] hole in New Mexico,
with temperatures always above 313° C [595.4° F]. That is more than 200°
C [392° F] hotter than the sea-level temperature of boiling water.

Radiogenic lead gradually leaks out of zircon
crystals, and does so more rapidly as the temperature increases. But
careful examination revealed that essentially none of the radiogenic
lead had diffused out of that super-heated zircon. This evidence
points strongly to a young age for the earth.

39 - ZIRCON/HELIUM RATIOS—When
uranium and thorium radioactively decay, they emit alpha particles—which
are actually helium atoms stripped of their electrons. Analysis of
the helium content of those same zircon crystals, from that same deep
New Mexico hole, revealed amazingly high helium retention in those
crystals. Yet helium is a gas and can diffuse out of crystals much
more rapidly than many other elements, including lead. Since heat
increases chemical activity, all that helium should be gone if the earth
were more than a few thousand years old.

40 - SOIL-WATER RATIO—There
is clear evidence in the soil beneath our feet that the earth is
quite young; for it is still in the partially water-soaked condition
that it incurred at the time of the Flood. This evidence indicates
that a Flood took place, and that it occurred not more than a few
thousand years ago. This is shown by water table levels (which, as you
know, we today are rapidly draining).

Next we shall consider EVIDENCE FROM THE
EARTH’S SURFACE that the earth is quite young:

41 - TOPSOIL—The average depth
of topsoil throughout the world is about eight inches.
Allowing for losses due to erosion, it has been
calculated that it requires 300 to 1,000 years to build one inch [2.54
cm] of topsoil. On this basis, the earth could only be a few thousand
years old.

42 - NIAGARA FALLS—The
French explorer, Hennepin, first mapped Niagara Falls in 1678. From that
time until 1842, the falls eroded the cliff beneath them at a rate of
about 7 feet [213 cm] per year. More recent calculations would
indicate a rate of 3.5 feet [106.68 cm] of erosion per year. Since
the length of the Niagara Falls gorge is about 7 miles [11 km],
the age of the falls would be 5,000 to 10,000 years.

But, of course, the worldwide Flood, the existence
of which is clearly established by rock strata and other geological
evidence, would have been responsible for a massive amount of initial
erosion of the falls.

There are a number of large waterfalls in the world
which plunge into gorges; and, over the centuries past, these were dug
out as the waterfall gradually eroded away the cliff beneath it. In each
instance, the distance of the cut that has been made, in relation to the
amount of erosion that is being made each year by the falls, indicates
only a few thousand years since the falls began.

Next we shall consider EVIDENCE FROM THE OCEANS
that the earth is quite young:

43 - RIVER DELTAS—Did you ever see an
air-view photograph of the Mississippi River delta? You can find an
outline of it on any larger United States map. That river dumps 300
million cubic yards [229 million cubic meters] of mud into the Gulf of
Mexico every year, at the point where the river enters the gulf. For
this reason, the State of Louisiana keeps becoming larger. Yet, for
the amount of sediment dumping that occurs, the Mississippi delta is not
very large. In fact, calculations reveal it has only been forming
for the past 4,000 years.

The Mississippi-Missouri river system is the longest
in the world and is about 4,221 miles [6,792 km] in length. Because,
below Cape Girardeau, flatland inundation along the Mississippi has
always been a problem, over a hundred years ago, Congress commissioned
*General Andrew A. Humphreys to make a survey of the whole area. It was
completed in 1861. The English evolutionist, *Charles Lyell, had earlier
made a superficial examination of the river and its delta and declared
the river system to be 60,000 years old since, he said, the delta was
528 feet [1609 dm] deep.

But Humphreys showed that the actual depth of the
delta was only 40 feet. Below that was the blue clay of the Gulf,
and below that, marine fossils. His discovery revealed that the lower
Mississippi valley used to be a marine estuary. Using Lyell’s formula
for age computation, Humphreys arrived at an age of about 4,620 years,
which would be approximately the time of the Genesis Flood.

Less data is available for other world river systems,
but what is known agrees with findings about the age of the Mississippi
delta.

Ur of the Chaldees was a seaport several thousand
years ago. Today it is almost 200 miles [322 km] from the Persian Gulf.
That distance was filled in as delta formation filled from the Tigris
and Euphrates rivers. Archaeologists date the seaport Ur at 3,500
B.C. Assuming that date, the delta formed at 35 miles [56 km] for every
1000 years.

According to evolutionary theory, everything occurs at a uniform rate
and the earth is billions of years old. If that is so, 80,000 years ago
the Persian Gulf would have reached to Paris! At the same rate of delta
formation, 120,000 years ago the Gulf of Mexico would have extended up
through the Mississippi River—to the North Pole!

44 - SEA OOZE—As fish and
plants in the ocean die, they drop to the bottom and gradually form an
ooze, or very soft mud, that is built up on the ocean floors.
This occurs at the rate of about 1 inch [2.54 cm] every 1,500 years.
Measuring the depth of this ooze, it is clear that the earth is quite
young.

45 - EROSION IN THE OCEAN—If
erosion has been occurring for millions of years, why below sea level in
the oceans do we find ragged cliffs, mountains not leveled, oceans
unfilled by sediments, and continents still above sea level?

An excellent example of this is the topology of
Monterey Bay, California. It is filled with steep underwater canyons—so
steep that small avalanches occur on them quite frequently. (See
*"Between Monterey Tides," National Geographic, February 1990, pp. 2-43;
especially note map on pp. 10-11.) If the earth were as old as the
evolutionists claim, all this would long ago have been flattened out.

46 - THICKNESS OF OCEAN SEDIMENTS—About
29 billion tons [26.3 billion mt] of sediment is added to the ocean each
and every year. If the earth were billions of
years old, the ocean floor would be covered by sediments from land
measuring 60 to 100 miles [96.5 to 160.9 km] thick, and all the
continents would be eroded away. But, instead, we find only a few
thousand feet of sediment in the ocean and no indication that the
continents have eroded away even once. Calculations on the thickness of
ocean sediments yield only a few thousand years for our planet.

The average depth of sediments on the ocean floor is only a little
over ½ mile [.804
km]. But if the oceans were billions of years old, the rate of sediment
deposit from

the continents would have resulted in a minimum of 60
miles [96.6 km] of sediments, on the ocean floors, and closer to 100
miles [160.9 km].

Plate tectonics theory (chapter 20, Paleomagnetism
[omitted from this book for lack of space; you will find it in
chapter 26 on our website])declares that gradually subducting
plates bury themselves deep into the earth, carrying with them the
sediments on top of them. But, according to that theory, this would only
remove about 2.75 x 1010
tons [2.49 mt x 1010] per
year, or merely 1/10th of the annual new sediments being added from the
continents!

The 60 miles [96.6 km] of ocean sediments needed by
the evolutionists for their theory is hopelessly missing.

47 - OCEAN CONCENTRATIONS—We
have a fairly good idea of the amount of various elements and salts that
are in the oceans and also how much is being added yearly by rivers,
subterranean springs, rainwater, and other sources.
A comparison of the two factors points to a young age for the ocean and
thus for the earth.

Of the 51 primary chemical elements contained in
seawater, twenty could have accumulated to their present concentrations
in 1,000 years or less, 9 additional elements in no more than 10,000
years, and 8 others in no more than 100,000 years. For example, the
nitrates in the oceans could have accumulated within 13,000 years.

48 - GROWTH OF CORAL—Coral in
the ocean grows at a definite rate. Analysis
of coral growth in the oceans reveals that ours is a young world.

"Estimated old ages for the earth are frequently based on ‘clocks’
that today are ticking at very slow rates. For example, coral growth
rates were for many years thought to be very slow, implying that some
coral reefs must be hundreds of thousands of years old. More accurate
measurements of these rates under favorable growth conditions now show
us that no known coral formation need be older than 3,500 years (A.A.
Roth, ‘Coral Reef Growth,’ Origins, Vol. 6, No. 2, 1979, pp. 88-95)."—W.T.
Brown, In the Beginning (1989), p. 14.

Next we shall consider EVIDENCE FROM LIVING
THINGS that the earth is quite young:

49 - TREE RINGS—The giant
sequoias of California have no known enemies except man. And only
recently did man (with his saws) have the ability to easily destroy
them. Insects do not bother them, nor even forest fires. They live
on, century after century. Yet the sequoias are never older than about
4,000 years. These giant redwoods seem to be the original trees that
existed in their timber stands. Sequoia gigantea, in their groves
in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, never have any dead trees ("snags")
among them. Unless man cuts them down, there is no evidence that they
ever die!

The University of Arizona has a department that
specializes in tree dating. *Edmund Schulman of its
Dendrochronological Laboratory discovered a stand of still older trees
in the White Mountains of California. These were bristlecone pines(Pinus longalva).

Beginning in 1978, Walter Lammerts, a plant
scientist, spent several years working with bristlecone pine seedlings
in their native habitat of Arizona. He discovered that the San Francisco
Mountain region, in which they grow, has spring and fall rains with a
very dry summer in between. Working carefully with the seedlings and
giving them the same type of watering and other climatic conditions that
they would normally receive,—he found that much of the time the
bristlecone pines produce two growth rings a year. This is an important
discovery, for it would indicate that the sequoias—not the bristlecone
pines—are probably the oldest living things on earth.

Think of it! Today we have just ONE generation of the Sequoia
gigantea! Both the parent trees and their offspring are still alive.
There is no record of any tree or other living thing that is older than
any reasonable date given for the Genesis Flood. In the case of the
giant sequoias, there is no reason why they could not have lived for
many thousands of years beyond their present life span.

50 - MUTATION LOAD—Before
completing this section on the evidence from living things, it is of
interest that one researcher, *H.T. Band, discovered in the early 1960s
that natural selection was not eliminating the "genetic load"
(the gradually increasing negative effect of mutation on living
organisms). Thus mutational defects are accumulating, even though
some are only on recessive genes. Calculations, based on genetic
load, indicate that life forms could not have continued more than
several thousand years—and still be as free from mutational defects as
they now are.

Much more information on mutations, including a more
complete discussion of genetic load, will be given in chapter 10,
Mutations.

Next we shall consider EVIDENCE FROM
CIVILIZATION that the earth is quite young:

(The information given in this section is somewhat
paralleled by material to be found in Ancient Cultures and As
Far Back as We Can Go, near the end of chapter 13, Ancient Man.
Additional material will be found there.)

51 - HISTORICAL RECORDS—If
mankind has been living and working on Planet Earth for millions of
years, why do we find records of man only dating back to about 2000-3500
B.C.? And these records, when found, reveal the existence of highly
developed civilizations.

As is shown more fully in chapter 13, Ancient Man,
the writings, language, and cultures of ancient mankind started off
fully developed—but are not found to have begun until about 2000-3000
B.C.

(1) Early Egyptian Records. The earliest historical books
are those of the Egyptians and the Hebrews. The historical dates
assigned to the beginnings of Egyptian and Sumerian history are based
primarily on king lists. The earliest records are the Egyptian
king-lists, dating from about the First Dynasty in Egypt, between 3200
and 3600 B.C. But internal and external evidence indicates that these
dates should be lowered. An Egyptologist writes:

"We think that the First Dynasty [in Egypt] began
not before 3400 and not much later than 3200 B.C. . . A. Scharff,
however, would bring the date down to about 3000 B.C.; and it must
be admitted that his arguments are good, and that at any rate it is
more probable that the date of the First Dynasty is later than 3400
B.C., rather than earlier."—*H.R.
Hall, "Egypt: Archaeology," in Encyclopedia Britannica, 1956
edition, Vol. 8, p. 37.

The problem with First Dynasty dates is they are
based on the king-lists of Manetho, an Egyptian priest who lived
many centuries later, in 250 B.C. Manetho’s writings have only been
preserved in a few inaccurate quotations in other ancient writings.
Barton, of the University of Pennsylvania, points out the problem here:

"The number of years assigned to each [Egyptian]
king, and consequently the length of time covered by the dynasties,
differ in these two copies, so that, while the work of Manetho forms
the backbone of our chronology, it gives us no absolute reliable
chronology."—George A. Barton, Archaeology and the Bible, p. 11.

Confusion in regard to Egyptian dating has continued
on down to the present time.

"In the course of a single century’s research,
the earliest date in Egyptian history—that of Egypt’s unification
under King Menes [first king of the first Egyptian dynasty]—has
plummeted from 5876 to 2900 B.C., and not even the latter year has
been established beyond doubt. Do we, in fact, have any firm dates
at all?"—Johannes Lehmann, The Hittites (1977), p. 204.

It is difficult to obtain exact clarity when examining ancient
Egyptian texts. A number of Egyptologists think that Manetho’s lists
dealt not with a single dynasty—but with two different ones that reigned
simultaneously in upper and lower Egypt. This would markedly reduce
the Manetho dates.

Manetho’s king lists give us dates that are older
than that of any other dating records anywhere in the world. But there
are a number of scholars who believe that (1) the list deal with two
simultaneously reigning sets of kings; (2) that they are not numerically
accurate; and (3) that Manetho fabricated names, events, numbers, and
history, as did many ancient Egyptian Pharaohs and historians, in order
to magnify the greatness of Egypt or certain rulers. For example, it
is well-known among archaeologists and Egyptologists that ancient
Egyptian records exaggerated victories while never mentioning defeats.
The Egyptians had a center-of-the-universe attitude about themselves,
and they repeatedly colored or falsified historical reporting in order
to make themselves look better than other nations around them.

In contrast, it is highly significant that
well-authenticated Egyptian dates only go back to 1600 B.C.!
Experts, trying to unravel Egyptian dating problems, have come to that
conclusion.

"Frederick Johnson, coworker with Dr. Libby [in
the development of, and research into, radiocarbon dating], cites
the general correspondence [agreement] of radiocarbon dates to the
known ages of various samples taken from tombs, temples, or palaces
out of the historical past. Well-authenticated dates are known only
back as far as 1600 B.C. in Egyptian history, according to John G.
Read (J.G. Read, Journal of Near Eastern Studies, 29, No. 1,
1970). Thus, the meaning of dates by C-14 prior to 1600 B.C. is
still as yet controversial."—H.M. Morris, W.W. Boardman, and R.F.
Koontz, Science and Creation (1971), p. 85.

Because cosmologists, chronologists, historians, and archaeologists
heavily rely on Egyptian dates for their theories, Egyptian dating has
become very important in dating the ancient world, and thus quite
influential. This is because it purports to provide us with the earliest
historical dates. There is evidence available that would
definitely lower archaeological dates and bring them into line with
Biblical chronology.

We planned to include a more complete study on this
subject in chapter 21, Archaeological Dating, but we had to
heavily reduce it for lack of space. However, you will find it in
chapter 35 on our website, evolution-facts.org.

(2) The Sumerians. The Sumerians were the
first people with written records in the region of greater Babylonia.
Their earliest dates present us with the same problems that we find with
Egyptian dates. *Kramer, an expert in ancient Near Eastern
civilizations, comments:

"The dates of Sumer’s early history have always
been surrounded with uncertainty."—*S.N. Kramer, "The Sumerians,"
in Scientific American, October 1957, p. 72.

(We might here mention that the carbon-14 date for
these earliest Near Eastern civilizations is not 3000, but 8000 B.C. In
chapter 6, Inaccurate Dating Methods, we will discover that
radiocarbon dating seriously decreases in reliability beyond about 1500
years in the past.)

52 - EARLY BIBLICAL RECORDS—(*#1/10
Ancient Historical Records*) The Bible is valid history and
should not be discounted in any scientific effort to determine dates of
earlier events. The Bible has consistently been verified by authentic
historical and archaeological research. (For an in-depth analysis of
a primary cause of apparent disharmony between archaeological and
Biblical dates, see chapter 35, Archaeological Dating, on our
website).

It is conservatively considered that the first
books of the Bible were written by Moses c. 1510-1450 B.C. (The date
of the Exodus would be about 1492 B.C.) Chronological data in the
book of Genesis would indicate that Creation Week occurred about 4000
B.C., and that the date of the Flood was about 2348 B.C.

Some may see a problem with such a date for the Genesis Flood. But we
are dealing with dates that are quite ancient. The Flood may have
occurred at a somewhat earlier time, but it may also be that the
earliest-known secular dates should be lowered somewhat, which is
probably the case here. It is well to remember that, in seeking to
corroborate ancient dates, we can never have total certainty about the
past from secular records, such as we find in Egypt and Sumer.

53 - ASTRONOMICAL RECORDS—Throughout
ancient historical writings, from time to time scholars come across
comments about astronomical events, especially total or almost total
solar eclipses. These are much more accurate time dating factors!
Because of the infrequency of solar eclipses at any given location and
because astronomers can date every eclipse going back thousands of
years, a mention of a solar eclipse in an ancient tablet or manuscript
is an extremely important find!

A solar eclipse is strong evidence for the dating of
an event, when ancient records can properly corroborate it.

We can understand why the ancients would mention
solar eclipses since, as such rare events, they involve the blotting out
of the sun for a short time in the area of umbra (the completely dark,
inner part of the shadow cast on the earth when the moon covers the
sun). Yet, prior to 2250 B.C., we have
NOT ONE record of a solar eclipse ever having been
seen by people! This is a very important item of evidence establishing a
young age for the earth.

"The earliest Chinese date which can be assigned
with any probability is 2250 B.C., based on an astronomical
reference in the Book of History."—*Ralph Linton, The Tree
of Culture (1955), p. 520.

54 - WRITING—The oldest
writing is pictographic Sumerian inscribed on tablets in the Near East.
The oldest of these tablets have been dated at about 3500 B.C. and
were found in the Sumerian temple of manna.

The earliest Western-type script was the proto-Sinaitic, which
appeared in the Sinai peninsula about 1550 B.C. This was the
forerunner of our Indo-Aryan script, from which descended our present
alphabet.

55 - CIVILIZATIONS—It is
highly significant that no truly verified archaeological datings
predate the period of about 3000 B.C. When larger dates are cited,
they come from radiocarbon dating, from methods other than written human
records, or from the suspect Manetho’s Egyptian king-list.

56 - LANGUAGES—Mankind is so
intelligent that languages were soon put into written records, which
were left lying about on the surface of the earth.
We know that differences in dialect and language suddenly developed
shortly after the Flood, at which time men separated and traveled off in
groups whose members could understand one another (Genesis 11:1-9).

The records of ancient languages never go back beyond
c. 3000 B.C. Philological and linguistic studies reveal that a
majority of them are part of large "language families"; and most of
these appear to radiate outward from the area of Babylonia.

For example, the Japhetic peoples, listed in Genesis
10, traveled to Europe and India, where they became the so-called Aryan
peoples. These all use what we today call the Indo-European
Language Family. Recent linguistic studies reveal that these
languages originated at a common center in southeastern Europe on the
Baltic. This would be close to the Ararat range. *Thieme, a Sanskrit
and comparative philology expert at Yale University, gives this
estimate:

"Indo-European, I conjecture, was spoken on the
Baltic coast of Germany late in the fourth millennium B.C. [c. 3000
B.C]."—*Paul Thieme, "The Indo-European Language," in Scientific
American, October 1958, p. 74.

For more information on languages, see chapter 13,
Ancient Man.

57 - POPULATION STATISTICS—Our present
population explosion is especially the result of improved sanitary
conditions at childbirth and thereafter. In earlier centuries, many more
children died before the age of three.

It is thought that the period between 1650 and 1850
would be a typical time span to analyze population growth prior to our
present century, with its many technological advantages. One
estimate, based on population changes between 1650 and 1850, provides us
with the fact that at about the year 3300 B.C. there was only one
family!

"The human population grows so rapidly that its
present size could have been reached in less than 1% (3200 years) of
the minimum time assumed (½ million years) for man on the basis of
radiometric dating."—Ariel A. Roth, summary from "Some Questions
about Geochronology," in Origins, Vol. 13, No. 2, 1886, pp.
59-60.

The rate of world population growth has varied
greatly throughout history as a result of such things as pestilences,
famines, wars, and catastrophes (floods, volcanoes, earthquakes, and
fires). But with all this in mind, estimates generally focus on 300
million as the population of the earth at the time of Christ. Based
on small-sized families, from the time of the Flood (c. 2300 B.C.) to
the time of Christ, the population by that time would have been about
300 million people.

If, in contrast, the human race had been on earth for
one million years, as the evolutionists declare, even with a very low
growth rate of 0.01 (1/100) percent annually, the resulting population
by the time of Christ would be 2 x 1043
people (2 x 1043 is the
numeral 2 followed by 43 zeros!). A thousand solar systems, with nine
planets like ours could barely hold that many people, packed in solid!

58 - FACTS VS. THEORIES—In 1862, *Thompson
said the earth was 20 million years old. Thirty-five years later,
in 1897, he doubled it to 40 million. Two years later, *J. Joly
said it was 90 million. *Rayleigh, in 1921, said the earth has
been here for 1 billion years. Eleven years later, *W.O.
Hotchkiss moved the figure up to 1.6 billion (1,600,000,000). *A
Holmes in 1947 declared it to be 3.35 billion (3,350,000,000);
and, in 1956, he raised it to 4.5 billion (4,500,000,000). Just
now, the age of the earth stands at about 5 billion years. Pretty
soon, someone will raise it again.

Men dream up theories, and then they call it science.

"These dates for the age of the earth have
changed, doubling on average every fifteen years, from about 4
million years in Lord Kelvin’s day to 4500 million now."—*Michael
Pitman, Adam and Evolution (1984), p. 235.

"Dr. A.E.J. Engel, Professor of the California
Institute of Technology, comments that the age for the earth
accepted by most geologists rose from a value of about 50 million
years in 1900 to about 5 billion years by 1960. He suggests
facetiously that ‘if we just relax and wait another decade, the
earth may not be 4.5 to 5 aeons [1 aeon = 1 billion years], as now
suggested, but some 6 to 8 or even 10 aeons in age.’ "—H.M.
Morris, W.W. Boardman, and R.F. Koontz, Science and Creation (1971),
p. 74 [referring to *A.E.J. Engel, "Time and the Earth," in American
Scientist 57, 4 (1969), p. 461].

Those long ages were assigned primarily because of a
19th-century theory about rock strata (see chapter 12, Fossils and
Strata) and supposedly confirmed by radioactive dating (the serious
problems of which are discussed in chapter 6).

In this chapter, we have seen a surprising number of
solid evidences for a young earth. They all point to a beginning for our
planet about 6,000 to 10,000 years ago.

The young earth evidence is powerful. As discussed in this
chapter, (1) ultraviolet light has only built up a thin layer of moon
dust; (2) short half-life radioactive non-extinct isotopes have been
found in moon rocks; (3) the moon is receding from earth at a speed
which requires a very young earth;—and on and on the solid evidence
goes, throughout the remainder of the chapter you have just completed.
Read it again. It is solid and definite. (4) The lack of ancient human
records on solar eclipses is alone enough to date man’s existence on the
earth. Men are so intelligent that, in various places on earth, they
have always kept written records—yet such records do not exist prior to
about 4300 years ago.

The evidence for Creation science is clear and
forthright.
In a word, it is scientific.

EVOLUTION COULD NOT DO THIS

The sponge is a creature which lives in many parts of
the world, and is regularly harvested in the Gulf of Mexico. This little
fellow has no heart, brain, liver, bones, and hardly anything else. Some
sponges grow to several feet in diameter; yet you can take one, cut it
up in pieces, and squeeze it through silk cloth, thus separating every
cell from every other cell, and then throw part or all of the mash back
into seawater. The cells will all unite back into a sponge! Yet a sponge
is not a haphazard arrangement of cells; it is a complicated structure
of openings, channels, and more besides. Yes, we said they have no
brains; but now consider what these amazing little creatures do: Without
any brains to guide him, the male sponge knows—to the very minute—when
the tide is about to begin coming in. Immediately he releases seeds into
the water and the tide carries them in. The female sponge may be half a
mile away, but she is smart enough (without having any more brains than
he has) to know that there are seeds from the male above her in the
water. Immediately recognizing this, she releases thousands of eggs
which float upward like a cloud and meet the male sperm. The eggs are
fertilized and new baby sponges are eventually produced. Really, now,
Uncle Charlie, you never explained the origin of the species. Can you
explain anything else about them?

Desert rats in Western U.S. can manufacture their own water! Oh, how
we wish we could do it as inexpensively! Our worldwide water shortage is
going to keep worsening. The rat does it be eating dry seeds, and then
combining the hydrogen in them with oxygen from the air—and presto!
nice, wet water! It is time for our scientists to journey out to the
desert and interview the little creature. Apparently, that little rat is
the only one who can solve our problem. If he will just tell us his
secret, we can all start making our own water from grain and air.

CHAPTER 4 - STUDY AND REVIEW QUESTIONS

THE AGE OF THE EARTH

GRADES 5 TO 12 ON A GRADUATED SCALE

1 - Working with your class, make some tree ring
samples and date them.

2 - Do you live near any of the types of evidences
listed in this chapter? Name them.

3 - On a map of the world, find where some of the
things which are evidences of a young earth are located.

4 - Out of all the evidences given in this chapter,
which show that our planet is quite young? Which five do you consider to
be the best? Memorize them, so you can later tell them to others.

5 - Which five do you consider to be the most
surprising? Why?

6 - Why is it that no historical records of any kind
go back beyond only a few thousand years B.C.?

7 - Scientists were certain that there should be an
extremely thick layer of dust on the moon. Why did they find almost no
dust on the moon?

8 - List seven of the strongest reasons from the
other planets that indicate a youthful age for our solar system.

9 - List three of the best evidences from our moon
that our world is only a few thousand years old. Which one do you
consider to be the best? Why?

10 - Which evidence from natural gas and oil do you
consider to be the best? Why?

11 - Why do evolutionists find it necessary every few
years to keep dramatically increasing the supposed age of the earth and
the universe?

12 - How many of the large number of evidences given
in this chapter would be sufficient to prove that the earth is not very
old?

13 - Why is the decay of earth’s magnetic field such
a powerful argument in favor of a young earth only a few thousand years
old?

14 - Write a report on one "early earth" evidence (that the earth is
not millions of years old) which especially interested you. After
completing it, explain it orally in class.